In Other Worlds
by FlyingFoxSly
Summary: Before the events of The Sons of Thestian, Rufus Merle has an evening of too much drink and getting ditched by his Prince. Emlynn has been itching to experiment her with a dangerous aspect of her gift since the events of I Belong to the Earth. She's about to get a nasty shock when a very hungover Rufus wakes up not in Harmatia...but in Yorkshire.
1. Chapter 1

**This is a Sons of Thestian / I Belong to the Earth (Unveiled) crossover fan fiction. I DO own half of these characters (Those belonging to the Unveiled Series) but they are used here in a non-canonical sense, in a setting that never happens in the actual series. In addition I identify M.E. Vaughan as the author of all characters and worlds belonging to The Sons of Thestian and The Harmatia Cycle, which I have borrowed for this story.**

 **This takes place a few months after the events in I Belong to the Earth but also pre-events in The Sons of Thestian. Yeah. Go figure the time/space continuum on that one ;)**

 **Story rating T. No known offensive content but potentially more adult themes such as drunkenness.**

Madeleine.

M. E. Vaughan

 **In Other Worlds**

It was the knife edge of twilight. That point where the sun had not yet dragged all colour from the sky and the stars – so familiar to him since his earliest childhood – were still the faintest pinpricks rather than the fiercely cold and frosty-bright spears of light they would become. Notameer and Athea were at that fragile point of balance before the dark goddess took ascendance, and he was already drunk. Drunker in fact than he could ever remember being though surely if he could sit...well... lie here contemplating his inebriation, then he must have had blacker nights?

Rufus could not remember how he had managed to get outside the wall. It struck him as deliciously funny that despite the increased security and the regular patrols of the Night Watch, that all one had to do to leave the city was drink enough rot-gut to become too fiendishly clever to get caught and too stupid to remember one's schemes. He laughed until he was forced to roll on his side and cough for breath.

The breeze was pleasant, bringing the scent of wild herbs and the fragrance of a flower he didn't recognise. Something sweet. Rufus leaned back and shut his eyes. It had started with Jionathan of course. When did it not start with the prince? But the lad was getting good at giving Rufus the slip, or Rufus had lost his edge. He didn't much care at the moment. There wasn't much left to care for.

He peered blearily up at the sky again. Then rubbed his eyes and stared. There was something wrong. The sweet, unfamiliar, floral scent was stronger. And the stars...the stars were gone. Rufus could have pointed to any constellation blind folded in the dark. But the celestial gatherings that reigned in the sky now, were not _his_ stars. They were alien. Unknown to him. Rufus reached a hand out skyward. He felt as if the earth were tilting beneath him. Trying to shrug him off as the unfamiliar stars wheeled over his head. He shut his eyes against the dizziness, the swooping sickness roiling in his gut, and somewhere in the middle of trying to fight off the fugue of alcohol and puzzling out where _his_ stars had gone, the ale had its way. Rufus passed out. His last thought was that he was lying on the source of that strange scent. A springy bed of flowering plants.

O_0_O

Lots of people get up early to walk on the moors, especially if it's summer and they have dogs – Arncliffe has quite the population of springer spaniels for a start. And it's not as if people don't camp out on the moors too in good weather. I mean you're mad to do it in the winter but July is fair game. So that had to be who that prone figure was. Just a camper, I told myself. Just someone out camping. Enjoying the stars last night, unfiltered by light pollution. Without a tent. Or a sleeping bag. Wearing what looked like medieval period costume and...oh hell. This was going to be another weird thing wasn't it? I had stopped by the stream when I spotted what I thought was a bundle of clothes and then I'd realised that the bundle had a foot...a hand...a head, with a mop of untidy dark hair,... poking out of the bundle.

For a moment I had a creeping, paranoid sense that somehow it was my fault he was lying there. Which was daft. Guilty conscience, I told myself but my attempt at levity made me wince. I really shouldn't have been doing... what I _had_ been doing. But then that's the trouble with someone – in this case Aunt Mary – telling you that you should leave something well alone; that you're not ready for it; that you lucked out before. Eventually you have to see if you can do it again or just go stark raving mad with wondering.

So I'd come out here - at 5.00am no less - where there should have been no chance of involving anyone else if something just happened to go a teeny bit wrong. I'd behaved responsibly. I shied away from looking too hard at my motivations. It had absolutely nothing to do with being ... well, bored. I took a few steps closer to the young man – I could see it was a man now – and the nearer I got, the more authentic his costume looked, mud splashes, wines stains and everything. Either he was some kind of seriously die-hard method actor or...

 _Or I've really bolloxed up this time..._

I took a deep breath. It was no good. If I had accidentally summoned one of the dead with my _experiment_ , then I was just going to have to fix it. At that moment the man mumbled something and rolled over, pulling his cloak over his face. There was no sense of death-cold. Just the crisp early morning air and the dew soaking into the hems of my jeans. He was alive.

"Eh-excuse m-me?" I said tentatively. "Er...Mr...er s-s-should you be... I mean..." I swallowed and tried again. "Eh-EXCUSE ME?"

I jumped back as the man lurched into a sitting position.

"Wha...?" He peeled his eyes open.

"Er...a-are you o-okay?" I wasn't keen on getting any closer now I'd caught a glimpse of the long knife in his belt. A prop, right? It couldn't be real. It wasn't legal to walk around with a dagger stuffed in your tunic, was it?

The man ignored me. He grasped a clump of heather and pulled a handful of flowers up in front of his face. I watched in bewilderment as he whipped his head from left to right, a growing expression of panic blooming on his face as whatever he was looking for continued to be unlocatable.

"Y-you ruh-really don't belong h-here, do you?" I had that cold, sinking sensation again. Grimly I clung to the hope that he was the victim of an elaborate prank. A stag do or something. He _did_ smell like a brewery – I could tell _that_ from where I was stood.

His gaze snapped up to meet mine. Eyes too blue to be called merely blue, but defied comparison with tired clichés like sapphires or speedwell. He stared at me with a strange mixture of curiosity and repulsion. I noticed idly that he was quite nice looking. A bit skinny maybe, but his features were fine and his eyes were piercing under that disordered, dark tangle of hair. Too bad I'd been ruined on male beauty by cheeky, Irish good looks and gold flecked eyes. Not now, I told myself firmly. _Concentrate._ I wondered for a moment if he understood English.

"Where have you taken me, witch?" His eyes blazed alarmingly. "Return me on the instant! I have duties and no time for your petty games."

"H-hey! I'm n-not a wuh-witch!" I bristled. That was what you got for stopping to help strangers who'd clearly been out on the razz.

"Then explain how came I to be here?" He looked around again. "This is not Harmatia..."

"N-no it's Y-Yorkshire." My scowl slipped. "Wuh what's Harmatia?"

He merely fixed me with that intense gaze again.

"I c-can't explain huh how you got h-here. B-but it m-might...just m-might be my f-fault..." I hunched my shoulders. "I w-was tr-trying something out and...s-suddenly there you were..."

"You pulled me out of my world," the man said flatly. "Are you sidhe?"

"Wuh what's that? L-like the f-fair folk?"

"Some call them so."

This was becoming too hard to follow and he kept knocking me off topic. "You r-r-really _aren't_ d-d-dead, are you?"

"At this moment in time I am not ruling anything out. But I would say not. No one who is dead could have such a vile headache. The gods are surely not so cruel."

I noticed the empty flagon lying on its side next to him. "Luh looks like it was suh-self inflicted." I tried very hard not to smirk. And failed.

"Yes, well that's beside the point..." he muttered, rubbing dew over his face.

I nibbled my lower lip. Ok it was possible that I had made a tiny – like really tiny – tear in our reality. Would that really have pulled him through? I didn't think so. It hadn't been easy to push resistant spirits through before. What were the chances that I had actually pulled someone living through from another world? I raised a hand, letting my fingers trail over the edges of dozens of realities on the air. Soft like moth wings, stacked like laundry in a cupboard. Maybe I had knocked one over or open or something? No, I decided. I couldn't have done this entirely by myself. So what was the most likely option? I just happened to snag on a stray thread of another reality while someone on that side also happened to be reaching through.

I looked at the man again and sighed. With my stammer it was going to take a really long time to explain my theory. Best start at the beginning.

"I'm E-Emlynn. H-hi." I was trying to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, after all it wasn't aimed at him. "Luh looks like y-you're having a cr-crappy morning."

I reached out a hand to help him up. He looked at me for moment, then grasped my hand. His skin burned. I flicked a sharp look at him. Under the hangover he didn't look feverish or ill. Which made me wonder exactly how human he was.

He swayed slightly on his feet, rubbing his head. "Rufus. Rufus Merle."

"N-nice to m-meet you." I winced. How incredibly stupid and little-girlish.

"And you, Em-lynn." He peered at me hopefully. "What now? Are you a magic wielder?"

"A w-what? Er n-no. I er j-just t-talk to the d-dead." No need to give him the full supernatural CV right now.

"Hmm..." Was that a faint hint of disapproval in his expression? Never mind. We were wasting time. I cringed when I thought of the tongue-lashing I was going to get from Mrs Cranford when I explained what I'd been up to but there was no help for it.

"I th-think you n-need tea. Or c-coffee. M-maybe breakfast. Th-then we need to work out what h-happened so we can suh-send you back."

"A sound plan thus far."

"Come on," I sighed. "W-we n-need Aunt M-Mary." I took hold of his sleeve and pulled him into a stumbling, unco-ordinated walk across the heath.

I was in so much trouble.

"Emlynn?"

"Hmm?"

"While I applaud this plan – especially the breakfast part – has it occurred to you that the gods may have sent me here for a reason?"

I gulped and walked faster.

So much trouble.


	2. Chapter 2

Two of the best things about Aunt Mary are that she always seems to know when I'm about to descend on her unannounced, and that she is nigh on impossible to shock. So I was counting on that as I knocked on the haint blue door of her cottage, whilst looking over my shoulder at Rufus. I had no idea what to do about him. He seemed well maybe not harmless but decent, initial rudeness aside. And really who wouldn't be a bit rude, waking up with what looked like the mother of all hangovers in the wrong place, time and probably universe. Pretty good grounds for being snappy. On the other hand he wasn't exactly low profile. Right now he was running his hands over Aunt Mary's battered Ford Fiesta and crooning under his breath like it was a restive horse. They probably didn't have the internal combustion engine in Harmatia, wherever that was, but if he kept doing things like that someone was definitely going to notice.

"Rufus!" I hissed, just as the cottage door opened.

"Good morning, Emily," said Mrs Cranford, her voice full of wry pleasure. "To what do I owe this very early vis-" She trailed off as Rufus ambled up beside me. "I see."

"Aunt M-Mary, I can e-explain..." I began sheepishly.

"I'm depending upon it," Aunt Mary replied, ushering us inside.

Rufus ducked under the lintel and looked around in apparent fascination. I watched as he gave the switched off TV a cursory glance before focusing on the bric-a-brac on the living room shelves. Aunt Mary's collection of protective objects. Not knowing what else to do, I took Rufus' cloak and pointed out the sofa, hoping he'd it down. He took the hint but his gaze continued to dart around the room. Clearly a hangover wasn't a major impediment to him when his curiosity was roused. I could hear the faint chink of china coming from the kitchen. I had until Aunt Mary carried in the tea tray to get my thoughts into some kind of order.

It wasn't going to happen.

What was I supposed to say? _So, Aunt Mary, you know how you told me to leave messing around with layers of reality and other dimensions until I'd, what was it? Oh Yeah! Grown into my powers a bit more? Well I kinda completely ignored the warning because well there's just nothing to do around here anymore. I mean it's so peaceful and I was curious and well here is the result; comes from another world, talks about strange gods and fair folk and weird stuff like that, dresses like Shakespeare in the park, is probably still drunk and runs at a temperature that means a normal human being would be dead. Oh but on the plus side, under that hangover he's easy on the eyes and – big bonus – not to my knowledge a mass murderer like a certain other man who used to frequent the moor. So all in all, not so bad?_

Yeah, that wasn't going to go over well at all.

Aunt Mary set a tray down and poured tea for all three of us. There was a large plate of buttered toast too, which Rufus accepted politely and tore into ravenously.

Mrs Cranford regarded me over the rim of her tea cup, eyes bright and eyebrows raised.

I swallowed. "So er Aunt M-Mary, this is R-R-Rufus. He's er v-visiting...a-a-accidentally..."

"Emily, I don't believe I've ever heard such a drastic understatement in my life. More tea Mr...?"

"Merle. Rufus Merle, madam. A pleasure." Rufus stood, placed one hand over his heart and bowed, before catching up Mrs Cranford's tiny bird-claw hand and pressing his lips lightly against her fingertips. If I hadn't known it was physically impossible, I would have thought that Aunt Mary was blushing. I rolled my eyes but at Mrs Cranford's impatient expression, I began a long and stammered version of what I thought had happened.

Where was Amy when you needed her? I thought miserably. She would have a perfect theory on this. Transdimensionality or something. I watched as Aunt Mary's expression grew tighter and tighter, wrinkles pulling in like gathers in cloth. I knew that look. It meant that she thought I'd screwed up but was waiting to find out how badly before she delivered a verdict.

I was pretty sure that playing around with other dimensions would have got me in enough trouble as it was. Actually bringing someone through a tear in reality, even if I didn't do it all by myself... I let my explanation taper off and waited. Aunt Mary wouldn't say anything until all her thoughts were marshalled.

She sighed. "Emily-" she began.

"Please, Madam, I am certain it was not all Emlynn's fault. It may well be mine. I was ... er...rather afflicted last night. It could have been me." Rufus was clearly trying to be helpful.

Mrs Cranford fixed him with a gimlet gaze. "Young man do you mean to tell me that you make a regular habit of shifting dimensions when you've had a shade too much to drink?"

"Er...well..." Rufus seemed taken aback by her ferocity.

"Do you, both of you, not think about the instability you may be causing across all dimensions when you play with these things?" She scowled at both of us in turn.

"N-neither of us meant t-t-to, Aunt M-Mary. It's j-just...what if w-w-we both huh-happened to be reaching o-out at the s-same time?" I pleaded.

"An accidental sympathetic connection," Rufus theorized, now deep in thought.

"You shouldn't have been reaching at all," Mrs Cranford sighed, looking at me.

I flushed.

"However, now you've forged a link somehow, we'll have to work out what it is so Rufus can return to his own place."

"L-link?" I asked just as Rufus said "but don't you think perhaps the gods meant for me to be here?"

"The gods," Mrs Cranford said darkly, "are best off minding their own affairs. At least on this plane of existence." Catching my eye she said more kindly, "cheer up, Emily. I'm sure we'll get to the bottom of it. Somehow, you two were both reaching as you put it, at the same time and a bond was forged. As soon as we know what that hinges on, we can find a way to dissolve it. Once that is done, you should find Rufus, that you'll be drawn back to your own world without too much trouble. It is your natural state to be there after all."

"It is an interesting theory," Rufus mused. "How will we go about finding the source of this bond?"

"Emily will tell us."

"M-me? But I d-don't nuh-know..."

"Emily you remember the exercise where I asked you to tell me where an object came from by touching it?" Mrs Cranford had her old wicked sparkle back in her eyes.

I scowled. I had not been good at that exercise at all. "I ruh-remember."

"I want you to take Rufus' hand and clear your mind..."

I sighed but reached out and took Rufus'outstretched hand in mine. I noticed again how fiercely hot his skin was. And then my mind exploded.

Or that's what it felt like.

I hadn't been ready. I hadn't even had a chance to clear my mind because I was sure it wasn't going to work. I was wrong.

It was like being launched off a cliff into utter darkness. Shards of starfire flashed by me, faster and faster until the sharp edges ground against each other to form a picture. A woman. Beautiful, with long dark hair. Pain. Hot knives ripping through my abdomen. And then agonising cold...emptiness without end. An emptiness I knew well, that I had carried inside me since Mum had died. A wound I had thought was healing. Rufus' pain tore the scar tissue off, leaving me raw with fresh grief. That was it. That was the link. Grief. Loss.

I let go of Rufus' hand. Tears streamed down my face but I was barely aware of them except as a salt sting on my lips. Rufus too had tears running down his cheeks but the tears never fell; they evaporated in little hisses of steam on his scalding skin.

"Emily?" Mrs Crandford sounded anxious.

In a daze I met Rufus' eyes. "Who is Mielane?" I whispered.

"No!" Rufus leapt to his feet and burst into flame.

I fell back against the coffee table. _What the holy hell_...

"Quick, Emily!" Mrs Cranford shouted.

I threw myself towards the hallway and a small fire extinguisher, then paused. I couldn't use flame retardant chemicals on a person, could I?

I turned again, head whipping around, looking for something...anything...

Mrs Cranford had already thrown the teapot over Rufus, followed by her tea cup anf a vase of flowers. It didn't put the flames out but it did seem to shock Rufus back into his senses. I watched in awe as the flames disappeared into his skin. Leaving him soot stained, dripping with vase water and festooned with limp flowers. And more or less naked I realised in horror. My strange visitor might be fire proof but his clothes weren't. I could feel blood rushing into my head like water into a balloon and more and more scraps of charred cloth fell off Rufus. I flung y gaze at the carpet. There was no way I was looking up right now.

"Emily, be a dear, run and get the spare dressing gown from the back of the bedroom door," said Mrs Cranford, as calmly as if a strange man had not just self immolated in her living room. I was only to happy to obey. Five minutes later, Aunt Mary was coaxing Rufus into a very pink, very frilly, flannel dressing gown and trying to persuade him to sit back down on the now somewhat charred sofa.

She picked up the tea tray and hooked an eyebrow at me. I followed her into the kitchen.

"Er...s-s-sorry?" I said.

"Well, my morning is turning out to be quite bracing, Emily. Have you any more surprises for me?"

I shook my head and then stopped and looked at her in horror. Aunt Mary had heard it too. The sound of the front door slamming. I dashed through the living room and into the hall, Mrs Cranford hobbling behind me. Yanking the door open, I looked down the street. A flash of pink caught my eye as Rufus disappeared in the direction of the church.

I exchanged one distraught glance with Aunt Mary and then took off after him. I was now chasing a naked, man from another world in Aunt Mary's second best dressing gown through the streets of Arncliffe under the curious gaze of every early rising gossip in the village. As bad days went, this was shaping up to be high in the top ten.


	3. Chapter 3

No. He wouldn't believe it. He couldn't. Rufus ran on, heedless of the shocked, pale ovals the faces of the people he passed, heedless of the buildings so like and yet unlike any buildings he was used too. A huge tower loomed up on his right and he veered on his path and pushed himself faster. And then there was no more town...and no more road...Just springy, heather sprung turf and a horizon that went on until the end of the world; mysterious shadows here and there hinting at folds and sly drops and falls. Proof that the land wasn't flat but full of pitfalls and cliff edges for the unwary.

Rufus realised that he had stopped without meaning too. His breath sawed in his throat, lungs burning. It was too wide, that horizon. Too alien. Too open. If he fell off the surface of this world would he find himself back in Harmatia or would he simply fall unchecked through the darkness between worlds forever? He shuddered and sank to the ground, long, thin legs splaying out from under the ridiculous robe. He dropped his face into his hands. His perpetually messy hair falling over the backs of his hands. A tickly, strangely mundane feeling in the midst of such madness.

"No," he croaked again, aware of how thirsty he was. It couldn't be the connection. It couldn't be what pulled him here. That strange girl with the burning green eyes... what he had seen in her head when she took his hand...what he had felt... Her grief waking his own to torture him. Mielane...no no no no...Rufus wanted wine. Strong spirits. Something to make the world fuzzy and non-threatening again. He lifted his head. There was nothing except the endless sea of rippling heather and the harsh cry of some native bird. No familiar citadel. No library to hide in. No tavern. No brothering magi.

He was alone.

0-O-0

I run fast, if gracelessly, and I have long legs. Over the last six months I'd _had_ to do a lot more running –away from danger, towards danger - so I'd gotten a lot better. I could run for longer. I was faster. None of this helped me at all in my chase after the man in the pink dressing gown. Rufus took off as if the hounds of hell were after him and he only picked up speed. In his wake was a trail of destruction; over turned plant pots and dropped groceries; a bicycle lying on its side, basket contents scattered on the road, one wheel still spinning. I leapt these obstacles and ran on. I caught glimpses of the residents of Arncliffe pointing and talking as I ran and if my face hadn't already been red from exertion, I would have been flushing with embarrassment. Not that I cared too much what they were saying...it was just the idea of the vicar's daughter, yes the _odd_ one, running after an essentially naked man on a Sunday morning just as the church bells started to peal... I shuddered internally. If there was any luck left in the universe I would never have to explain this to Dad.

I tore past the church, to the place where the road gave way to moor and paused, breathing hard. Where was he? Surely he couldn't have gone back to Harmatia, wherever that was? Not without help. So where had he gone? I scanned the moor but no flash of pink broke the gentle purple waves of heather and shadow. Sighing I closed my eyes and forced my breathing to slow. Gradually, I relaxed. I felt the earth beneath my feet, the breeze on my hot skin, the faint heat at the heart of the outcrops of granite. A hawk hovered far out on a thermal. Below a tiny heart thrummed a fast life in the bird's shadow. And there. A wrong note. Something or someone not of the moor. A man. Rufus.

Got you!

My eyes snapped open and I set off across the heath. By this point I was started to feel more than a little annoyed. Ok so I was partially responsible for removing Rufus from his home world. And yes he had the right to be upset. Probably the whole unintentional 'mind-meld' had pushed him past tipping point. But seriously? Setting yourself on fire? Running through the streets in your birthday suit and an old lady's dressing gown? I rolled my eyes, gritting my teeth together. "And they s-say wuh-women are hysterical..." I muttered darkly. Sure, if I'd been transdimensionality shifted then I would be freaking out but I wouldn't be ...popping out of my clothes and into an evil-keneevil flame suit. I paused on the lip of the hollow, a pang squeezing my heart. Ciarán and I came here. This was our place. He'd been gone for months now though...

"R-Rufus?" I called. "Rufus!"

"Emlynn?" his voice came out wobbly and unsure.

I slid down into the hollow to find Rufus sat on a round flat stone at the bottom. "Rufus," I sighed with relief. "Ah-are you okay?"

"Emlynn where am I?" His face was pale and his eyes were red-rimmed. I immediately felt bad for being annoyed.

"Yuh-Yorkshire, y-you remember."

"Very well. And who are they?" Rufus continued to stare past me, his voice strangely flat. I looked u and saw them. The tall, dark haired black eyed man. The girl in a rust-coloured gown, long chestnut hair whipped by another worldly wind. It had been a long time. I raised an eye brow at the pair but they had already begun to fade as their sphere pulled away from ours again. Hardiman would not meet my eyes, pretended I wasn't there although I could tell he knew I was. But Kate flung back her hair and gave me a wild, wicked smile, sherry coloured eyes glittering. I could almost hear her laughter as she finally disappeared.

"They're n-not important. J-just a couple of h-haunts."

"Ah," Rufus said in that dead calm voice. "Spirits of the dead. That is the problem isn't it." His eyes fixed on me and it felt like being swept up in the blue beam of searchlight.

"Is it?" I paused. The moor was not a good place for people with abilities. Not in too great a dose to start with anyway. And Rufus was going to need clothes. I really hoped that burning his garments off wasn't a regular issue. "L-look you c-can't st-stay like here this. C-come on?" I held out my hand.

Rufus reached out to take it and then our eyes locked again. I was certain we both pulled the same expression. We both whipped our hands away before they could touch. There was no need to check if he was having the same thought as me; that bad things happened when we reached toward each other; that we found out things we both would rather stayed buried when we joined hands.

I forced a smile. "C-come on. Wuh-we have to get you some clothes."

For the first time Rufus grinned. It made him look surprisingly young. I felt heat rising in my cheeks but grinning Rufus would be a lot easier to shift than morose, emo Rufus. At least that's what I told myself.


	4. Chapter 4

Amy was gone. As in missing, gone. I hated it when she did that.

Rufus turned to see why I was still standing like a halfwit in the kitchen doorway. I could see his lips moving but my ears were full of the rushing sound of water. The breeze off the moor brought the scent of stocks and sweet williams and golden rod in from the garden but it didn't matter because Amy was gone. Her text books were scattered over the scrubbed pine table all open at various pages. There was a cup of half drunk tea in Amy's favorite mug standing cold nearby. Her precious copy of 'A Brief History of Time', foxed and dog eared but which she gloated over as if it were The One Ring, sat on top of a pile of notes. Of course she might have just nipped to the bath room. Or gone out ant left her favourite books everywhere. She might have done. Except there was a wide ash-grey ring in a perfect circle around Amy's chair where it was pushed away from the table.

I swallowed hard, tasting bile. It couldn't have happened. It just...it...

"Emlynn!" Rufus' hands were hot on my upper arms through my tee-shirt. "Who is Amy?"

I looked up at him."M-my sis-sister. She was s-s-s'pposed to be here but..." I looked helplessly from Rufus to the ring of ash and the horrible suspicion that had been needling away at the back of my mind crystalised.

"S-she's g-gone."

Rufus let go of me and ran a finger through the circle of ash. "Transubstantiation." He looked up at me. "She's been swapped."

"Y-you m-mean she's in Huh-Harmatia? B-bring her back!" I could picture Amy, lost in a strange alien world, in the dark, where the rules weren't the same and there were real magical beasts and people who could do magic and... "R-Rufus you h-have to bring her b-back! She's th-thirteen!"

Rufus held up both his hands placatingly. He was still on one knee in the ash pile, still in that ridiculous dressing gown. I had balled my hands into fists and was ready to lash out at someone...anyone...

And that was when Grace walked in.

"Hey, Gremlin. Not at church this morn..." Grace trailed off and for the first time I realised how truly strange this looked from the outside.

"Er this isn't w-what it l-looks like..." I hunched my shoulders.

Rufus turned towards Grace and tried to smile reassuringly. Maybe it was the dressing gown but the smile just looked queasy.

"Really? I'm glad you cleared that up, Gremlin, because it looks a bit effing weird from where I'm standing." Grace folded her arms and glanced around. "Where's Amy?"

"She er..well your sister..." Rufus stalled.

"A-Amy went on a s-sort of eh-exchange trip." I didn't do much better.

"An exchange. Right." Grace nodded towards Rufus. "So who's the lanky emo with the goatee and why is he wearing women's nightwear? Please tell me he has underwear on."

"Er th-this is R-Rufus and he's the eh-exchange student?" I was flinching awya from my own words. "He er w-well the b-bathrobe...it's c-complicated b-but we're going to g-get A-Amy back..."

Grace sighed. "When you say exchange...?"

"S-somewhere a b-bit fuh-further than France."

"Harmatia," Rufus said, rising from his crouch and not leaving a lot to the imagination in the process. I flushed but Grace merely smirked. "If Amy is as sensible as Emlynn then you need have no fear that she will be er eaten

"E-eaten?!"

"...or that any harm will come to her," Rufus forged on.

Grace looked back and forth between the two of us. "You think Emlynn is sensible? Ok, don't answer that. And don't give me the specifics. Really don't." She held up a hand to cut Rufus off as he opened his mouth to explain. "I'll just deal with the practical stuff. You," Grace pointed at Rufus, "need clothes. You ...well you just can't walk around like that. And You," Grace rounded on me. I was surprised to see that despite having gone very pale at finding Amy missing, she was actually grinning. "Gremlin, you have the weirdest taste in friends. I'll find him some old things of Dad's."

"Nothing too flammable," I hissed.


	5. Chapter 5

I found Rufus wandering around the orchard half an hour later. He looked as out of place in Dad's cast offs – beige corduroy trousers and a checked shirt – as no doubt I would have looked in a gown from Rufus' world. I pursed my lips. There was no way I could explain Rufus to Dad. I hoped Mrs Cranford didn't mind putting him up for the night if it came to it.

"Emlynn," he called cheerily.

I pasted a smile on over my anxiety for Amy and walked toward him. "So...er b-better that the d-dressing g-gown?"

"Most confortable," Rufus said fingering the fine cotton of the shirt. "And such ingenious fastenings." I went hot with embarrassment before realising he was pointing to the zip and not to his groin in general.

"N-no z-z-zips in Harmatia?"

"No, though it is a design I may copy." Rufus looked up at the sky again and a frown clouded his face.

"W-what is it?" I couldn't see anything amiss. Just clear summer sky. Which was pretty good going in Yorkshire.

"I cannot feel them. Athea is hidden from me."

"F-feel who? A-Athea?"

Rufus turned to meet my gaze and once again I had that sense of falling through space. I blinked hard. "The stars. The gods. Athea is...well I was born under her. I should feel it she and Notameer change places in the great dance."

"Y-you lost m-me."

"It is no more complicated than your religion surely. What gods do you revere?"

"Er..." I baulked at the thought of trying to explain Christianity to Rufus. And saying that I personally followed no gods at all seemed as though it would take us even further down the tangent when all I wanted was Amy back. Not that I didn't like Rufus. In some ways he was almost as good as Amy, but he wasn't my sister and the longer she was gone the more sick with worry I felt. "It's c-cmplicated," I settled. "S-so Athea, c-can you c-connect with her a-all the time?"

"I am always aware of her. But it is strongest at Sunset when she rises."

I gave Rufus a long hard look. "The s-sun doesn't usually s-set at 2.30 in the afternoon."

It was Rufus' turn to give me a very long-suffering, patient stare. The kind I got from Amy when she was trying to explain string theory to me. "I think the spacial harmonics of your world and mine resonate on different frequencies. It would cause a temporal lag." His overly kind surely-you-know-this tone grated on my nerves.

"Y-you muh mean time is d-different there?"

"Exactly," Rufus gave me the kind of smile a pleased teacher would give a slow student who had just managed to catch up with the class. My temper flared.

"Fuh-fascinating as th-that is, while w-we waste t-time, A-Amy is lost. B-by herself. In y-your world. P-probably getting e-eaten!" I snapped.

"I am happy to hear your plan to return me to my own world, Emlynn," Rufus said, a touch of irritation showing in his own voice.

"W-why d-don't you know? Y-you're a muh-magi. Can't you j-just..." I raised a hand and flickered my fingers to suggest magic.

"No." The word was flat, definite. Rufus' face darkened with painful knowledge. With memories he didn't want to share. I knew that look. I'd worn it myself.

"R-Rufus, we n-need to t-talk about what h-happened. Wh-what the link is-"

"I said No!"

"But if w-we d-don't b-break the link...what a-about A-Amy?!"

"Just...no. I'm sorry but that thing you ask of me...that is a thing I cannot do."

"I nuh-nkow wh-what grief is like, Rufus." I had to get through to him. Why was he being so obtuse?

He rounded on me so swifly that I startled, his shadow flung out behind him as if he were still wearing a cloak – not behaving like a shadow at all. "Do you? What can you know? How can you speak as if you hear the murmurings of another's heart when you are a mere neophyte at the gates of life? Do not speak to me of loss, do not for I have known greater..." and then his gaze locked with mine and the echo of what our minds had shared that morning rippled between us. The difference was that I held myself open and Rufus tried to snatch away.

"I know loss," I said softly.

He let his gaze fall, as if ashamed. "You do. I see that. Forgive me. I spoke unguardedly." He took a deep breath and straightened. "However it is all one for on somethings I will not speak. I cannot." His eyes shone with unshed tears. "Please, Emlynn, as we are friends, do not ask me."

I nodded, a lump in my own throat. Whatever connected us, I could feel the echoes of his pain and it was nearly crippling. I couldn't imagine how I could have stood under the onslaught if my own grief had been fresher. If I had not started to heal. I sensed that Rufus had not begun to heal. There was still poison in his wounds. But that's the thing with grief. No one can fix it for you. All you can do is carry it and one day face it. Forcing Rufus to confront his loss and the guilt and anger behind it would only make him erect stronger barriers. I knew this. I'd spent a long time doing it myself. Without thinking I reached out and squeezed his hand. When words fail – and mine fail often – simple contact speaks so much more. Rufus nodded slightly and squeezed my hand back. It was a sign of friendship, of understanding. It was a good thing in a universe that had turned upside down.2

"Gremlin?" I looked up when I heard Grace call from the kitchen door. "Em? Are you and Captain Renaissance out there?"

"H-here." I pulled Rufus after me.

"Gremlin, Mrs C is on the phone," Grace's tone had none of her usual spikey humour. "It sounds urgent. Best break out your proton pack."

I went numb from my neck down but somewhere my heart began to thrash out a frantic rhythm of excitement. It was one of _those_ calls. The kind that I had to deal with personally. I glanced at Rufus, what was I going to do with him? And what about Amy?

"Take your knight in shining corduroy with you. I'll cover for you with Dad," Grace paused. "And I'll stay here, so someone is in when Amy gets back."

"B-but..."

"Gremlin only you can do this. Staying here isn't going to help Amy. You can unriddle him on the way. Go!"

Right.

"Where are we going?" asked Rufus.


	6. Chapter 6

I couldn't begin to list the ways in which this was a bad idea. Rufus was ... well, oddly sweet and clearly very sad, deep down, and yeah he had a certain facility with fire and who knew what else. But here, in my world, he was awkward and maladroit. It wasn't his fault but... I sighed. I really hoped he wasn't going to burn his clothes off again. Aunt Mary was one thing. Even Grace was kinda cool about it. But if he lost it in front of the woman Aunt Mary had sent me – and by extension us – to see... I just wasn't _that_ good at lying. I nibbled my lower lip and worried.

The house was an old farm building, easily a couple of miles outside Arncliffe. It looked almost as old as the vicarage, though in better repair. Someone had tried to blend the modern and the antiquated. There were three steps up to the front door and a small figure wearing ragged jeans and a much-too-large sweatshirt was sat on the middle step, apparently in deep conversation with a scruffy, well-loved old toy donkey. She looked up at me, eyes the strangest shade of midnight blue under a mop of brilliant sunset red hair. Someone had tried to drag those curls into a semblance of order in two thick pigtails – tried and failed.  
"Hello." The girl didn't look at all surprised to see us.

"Er H-hi..." I started. "Um is your m-mum in?"

The girl looked at me sceptically. "That depends."  
""On w-what?" it really shouldn't be that easy for a nine-year-old to wrong-foot me.  
"Why you're here." The word 'obviously' was contained in the bony-shouldered shrug she gave me.  
"I w-was asked to huh-help?" I said.  
The girl stared at me. I couldn't help a sudden mental comparison between the unblinking stares of children who know you're not very sure of yourself and that of wolves or hyenas. I shook my head.  
"Allow me," murmured Rufus. He dropped to one knee in front of the girl. "Hello, little one. My name is Rufus. What do they call you? And who is this fine and noble steed?"  
The girl looked from Rufus to me and back again. Her small features held the kind of 'are you kidding me' expression that only children, confronted by an adult they find absurd, can manage."I'm not supposed to talk to strangers," she told Rufus in a flat voice. "What's wrong with him?" She turned to me.  
"There's n-nothing wrong with R-Rufus. He's j-just visiting. N-not from En-England." Rufus just looked bewildered. I wondered how children acted in his world when addressed by an adult.  
"Okay." The girl turned back to her stuffed animal. "You haven't told me your name."  
"Emlynn. S-so can we-talk to your muh-mother?" I couldn't quite keep the impatience out of my voice.  
"Mum's sleeping. She doesn't sleep much at night. Not now." The little girl didn't bother to look up at me. I knew getting cross was not going to help and bit back a retort.  
"Does your mother sleep ill because of strange things happening at night?" Rufus tried again. "You must tell us if it so. Emlynn here can help. She is most accomplished with ghosts and spectres."  
I could feel heat creeping along my cheekbones. It had never occurred to me that I needed to explain to Rufus that most people just didn't believe in anything supernatural. That you just didn't drop the Dead into casual conversation. And you definitely didn't suggest that there were ghosts about to a small child, no matter how difficult she was. If her mother realised... if the girl started having nightmares... My mother would have scalped anyone who'd frightened her girls. I swallowed hard. "R-Rufus? C-could I have a w-word...?" I began.  
The girl abruptly stood up. She was short and skinny, all knees and elbows and huge eyes. "Why didn't you say it was about the ghosts in the first place?" she demanded. She rolled her eyes. I could almost hear her thinking 'was there anything more trying than an adult!' "I'm Maeve." She stuck out a grubby, sticky hand which Rufus shook without a trace of disgust. I smiled and hoped that would be enough. "I can show you where it happened. The bad thing." She trotted off around the side of the house. Rufus and I glanced at each other and followed her.  
"She is a most unusual child," Rufus muttered. Privately, I agreed although I was hardly in a position to throw stones.  
Maeve stopped at the bottom of the gently sloping garden. There was nothing to block the view of the rolling moor beyond save an old dry stone wall. I exchanged a puzzled glance with Rufus. Exactly what was Maeve trying to tell us.  
"I'm not going any further," Maeve said flatly. "It's there. That's where that thing came from." She pointed a grubby finger at a raised, greenish hump. It came up to about knee height on me. Waist height for the little girl.  
"A well?" Rufus said. "It does not appear to have been used in some time."  
I realised he was right. Moss and lichen had grown over the stones, and the wooden well cover was green with rot. "Er r-remind me to explain about running water at s-some point," I muttered. "M-Maeve, wh-what thing? What do you muh-mean?"  
Maeve's small face had closed in, her expression shuttered against me and Rufus.  
"D-did something crawl out of the wuh-well?" I tried again.  
Maeve worried her lower lip with baby incisors and shook her head but she wasn't saying no. She was trying to deny anything was wrong at all. Her face was so pale that her freckles stood out like spatters of mud. I realised she was shaking.  
"Here now, little one, no need to be afraid anymore. We will take care of it." Rufus had crouched down to her level again and held his arms out. Maeve didn't scorn an adult presence now but flung herself at him in a desperate hug, fine tremors racking her small frame. "Can you be very brave and tell us what you saw?"  
Maeve looked between us with wide, frightened eyes.  
"Y-you can tr-trust us," I said, trying to make my voice as soothing as Rufus'. He seemed to have more of a knack with children than I did.  
"Greenteeth."One word, whispered so softly that I wasn't sure I had heard her at all. Then I met Rufus' blazing eyes and knew he had heard her too.  
"Gr-greenteeth? Wh-what's that?"/pBut Maeve shook her head. "Can we go back now?" she asked Rufus.  
"I juh-just need to ch-check something," I began but Rufus shook his head.  
"I will take the child back. Whatever you need to do must wait." When he spoke like that it was hard to argue with him, or to miss the power that slumbered beneath his skin. I tried anyway.  
"I just n-need a minute... if anything is there," I waved at the well. I reached out with my gift... Like a trailing fishig line it caught o something. Something very old, that felt like cold, wet darkness and hunger... I hardly heard Maeve as I pulled my mind back with a gasp, heart thrumming. For a second it felt as if something squatting down in chill depths of the well had caught hold of me and was trying to pull me down...  
"No!" Maeve yelled. "Don't! She'll come. And she'll send Toby after me again."  
Rufus gave me a reproachful look, clearly not realising what had just happened to me. "Who is Toby? Is Toby trying to hurt you?"  
"Toby is my brother." Maeve pulled free of Rufus' arms and stood for a moment managing to look both angry and panicked, before tearing away from us back up the garden to the house. I tried to pull air into my constricted lungs.  
"I have heard the name Greenteeth before," Rufus said, looking the way Maeve had gone. "If your world and mine are aligned in this also, then we have problem. But why would she run from her brother?"  
"B-because T-Toby is dead," I replied. "There is a ch-child's spirit trapped in that well." I swallowed hard. "And something else is down there in the dark with him." 


End file.
